Women Negotiating Boundaries : Gender, Law and the Indian State

Abstract

Based on a case study of the struggle of 40 Gujrati women street traders to protect their right to trade from a pavement in Delhi, this article argues that both the particular splintered complexity of a post-colonial state formation, such as India, and also a multiplicity of the strategies of struggle based on their class, caste and economic position, are needed by women to confront and/or use state fractions in their own interests. It concludes by pointing to the potential for a strategy for struggle that is both 'in and against' the state.